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$10-20k is very little a 30 year mortgage. If you're buying an expensive house than that then you can definitely afford the baseline cost of solar panels. If yo

$10-20k is very little a 30 year mortgage. If you're buying an expensive house than that then you can definitely afford the baseline cost of solar panels. If you live in an area with high housing prices and can't afford to buy then you're renting, and the costs of solar installed on multifamily is shared across all tenants. The cost of solar panel production and installation will drop as processes become more efficient, and solar panel production costs are (were?) being halved every year or two so the $10-20k price tag will continue dropping despite tariffs. Private solar energy will also reduce costs of maintaining a grid, reduce odds of widespread power failure, and reduce costs of environmental externalities of other forms of energy production. California is also pushing hard for electric vehicles. Solar powered electric vehicles reduce reliance on oil production and imports. I don't live in CA but it seems to me they're playing the long game by reducing government ownership/operation of energy systems while reducing the costs of energy for all Californians to a low equilibrium state that reflects the cost of solar panels, which will drop over time. I wish Texas were more interested in these kinds of programs rather than bathroom legislation.

pmiller2 8y ago
What if I’d rather have the $20k?
- heurist 8y ago
  Buy a cheaper house
zrobotics 8y ago
>>Private solar energy will also reduce costs of maintaining a grid, reduce odds of widespread power failure You have claimed this multiple times in this thread, but I'll need a citation to believe this. How, exactly, will residential solar make maintaining the grid cheaper? The houses are still tied in to the local utility, so unless you are trying to claim that what causes maintenance costs is literally the amount of power flowing through the wire and not weather/age then I don't believe this for a second. Edit:typo
- heurist 8y ago
  The above is my only post in this thread as of writing this comment. If everyone can produce their own energy, then you don't need to extend a grid and can reduce its operations over time. Right now energy is going from renewable sources into the grid, but eventually it will be a mesh network of energy distribution among neighbors/communities. Don't ask me how we get to that point economically because I don't know - I'm just wearing my systems engineering hat :)
  - zrobotics 8y ago
    Sorry, confused you w/ someone else. Question though:without a utility company, who is going to pay to maintain that network? We already have an existing mesh network of multiple power generators w/ the associated distribution systems. My father's house is off-grid solar, mostly due to the $18k required to run ~1 mile of overhead line. Currently these costs are distributed over a large # of customers, and a large interconnected grid is required for the plan of using EV batteries as distributed storage.
    - heurist 8y ago
      I imagine private companies will maintain connections between properties, and property owners will maintain the panels. Not so different from hiring a plumber or electrician. The incentive to network maintainers is the opportunity to sell off excess energy to other homes, businesses, schools, and maybe even other states. The incentive to home owners is that they'd take profit on excess energy sold by the network maintainers. Or maybe maintainers would retain the profit but maintain the privately owned solar panels at no or low cost. Or community groups could band together to create a mesh net like some municipalities are doing for internet. There are many proven business models that would apply here.
TexasEcon23 8y ago
>>$10-20k is very little a 30 year mortgage. If you're buying an expensive house than that then you can definitely afford the baseline cost of solar panels. If you live in an area with high housing prices and can't afford to buy then you're renting, and the costs of solar installed on multifamily is shared across all tenants. The cost of solar panel production and installation will drop as processes become more efficient, and solar panel production costs are (were?) being halved every year or two so the $10-20k price tag will continue dropping despite tariffs. That statement doesn't make sense. You have to compare the net present value of an upfront investment with the electricity savings over time. If you amortize that amount over 30 years it doesn't change the fact you made the upfront payment, you just pay the bank extra money (interest) for the privilege of differing payment. >>Private solar energy will also reduce costs of maintaining a grid, reduce odds of widespread power failure, and reduce costs of environmental externalities of other forms of energy production. California is also pushing hard for electric vehicles. Solar powered electric vehicles reduce reliance on oil production and imports. I don't live in CA but it seems to me they're playing the long game by reducing government ownership/operation of energy systems while reducing the costs of energy for all Californians to a low equilibrium state that reflects the cost of solar panels, which will drop over time. I wish Texas were more interested in these kinds of programs rather than bathroom legislation. None of that supports the claim that it is a worthwhile investment to install solar panels on homes. It doesn't follow logically at all. Externalities are the exact reason regulations exist. If you want to argue that the cost is worthwhile for society do it, but none of that has anything to do with the price to a homeowner of installing solar panels.
- heurist 8y ago
  The upfront investment on a mortgage is the down payment, which can be as high or low as you want these days. Buying a house for $310k vs $300k works out to ~$100/month going from on a 30 year fixed-rate mortgage, $10k down (depending on interest rates). About $30k difference on total loan payments, or $1k/year, which at least for me in Texas is at the low end of much I pay for energy anyway. Plus you're not paying for residential energy (system maintenance aside), and maybe not gas if you're using an electric vehicle. You're not thinking about fluctuations in oil prices either, which will certainly increase over the next 30 years. The societal benefit is a separate bonus, as you stated, but not one to ignore.

pmiller2 8y ago

What if I’d rather have the $20k?

heurist 8y ago
Buy a cheaper house

zrobotics 8y ago

>>Private solar energy will also reduce costs of maintaining a grid, reduce odds of widespread power failure You have claimed this multiple times in this thread, but I'll need a citation to believe this. How, exactly, will residential solar make maintaining the grid cheaper? The houses are still tied in to the local utility, so unless you are trying to claim that what causes maintenance costs is literally the amount of power flowing through the wire and not weather/age then I don't believe this for a second. Edit:typo

heurist 8y ago
The above is my only post in this thread as of writing this comment. If everyone can produce their own energy, then you don't need to extend a grid and can reduce its operations over time. Right now energy is going from renewable sources into the grid, but eventually it will be a mesh network of energy distribution among neighbors/communities. Don't ask me how we get to that point economically because I don't know - I'm just wearing my systems engineering hat :)
- zrobotics 8y ago
  Sorry, confused you w/ someone else. Question though:without a utility company, who is going to pay to maintain that network? We already have an existing mesh network of multiple power generators w/ the associated distribution systems. My father's house is off-grid solar, mostly due to the $18k required to run ~1 mile of overhead line. Currently these costs are distributed over a large # of customers, and a large interconnected grid is required for the plan of using EV batteries as distributed storage.
  - heurist 8y ago
    I imagine private companies will maintain connections between properties, and property owners will maintain the panels. Not so different from hiring a plumber or electrician. The incentive to network maintainers is the opportunity to sell off excess energy to other homes, businesses, schools, and maybe even other states. The incentive to home owners is that they'd take profit on excess energy sold by the network maintainers. Or maybe maintainers would retain the profit but maintain the privately owned solar panels at no or low cost. Or community groups could band together to create a mesh net like some municipalities are doing for internet. There are many proven business models that would apply here.

TexasEcon23 8y ago

>>$10-20k is very little a 30 year mortgage. If you're buying an expensive house than that then you can definitely afford the baseline cost of solar panels. If you live in an area with high housing prices and can't afford to buy then you're renting, and the costs of solar installed on multifamily is shared across all tenants. The cost of solar panel production and installation will drop as processes become more efficient, and solar panel production costs are (were?) being halved every year or two so the $10-20k price tag will continue dropping despite tariffs. That statement doesn't make sense. You have to compare the net present value of an upfront investment with the electricity savings over time. If you amortize that amount over 30 years it doesn't change the fact you made the upfront payment, you just pay the bank extra money (interest) for the privilege of differing payment. >>Private solar energy will also reduce costs of maintaining a grid, reduce odds of widespread power failure, and reduce costs of environmental externalities of other forms of energy production. California is also pushing hard for electric vehicles. Solar powered electric vehicles reduce reliance on oil production and imports. I don't live in CA but it seems to me they're playing the long game by reducing government ownership/operation of energy systems while reducing the costs of energy for all Californians to a low equilibrium state that reflects the cost of solar panels, which will drop over time. I wish Texas were more interested in these kinds of programs rather than bathroom legislation. None of that supports the claim that it is a worthwhile investment to install solar panels on homes. It doesn't follow logically at all. Externalities are the exact reason regulations exist. If you want to argue that the cost is worthwhile for society do it, but none of that has anything to do with the price to a homeowner of installing solar panels.

heurist 8y ago
The upfront investment on a mortgage is the down payment, which can be as high or low as you want these days. Buying a house for $310k vs $300k works out to ~$100/month going from on a 30 year fixed-rate mortgage, $10k down (depending on interest rates). About $30k difference on total loan payments, or $1k/year, which at least for me in Texas is at the low end of much I pay for energy anyway. Plus you're not paying for residential energy (system maintenance aside), and maybe not gas if you're using an electric vehicle. You're not thinking about fluctuations in oil prices either, which will certainly increase over the next 30 years. The societal benefit is a separate bonus, as you stated, but not one to ignore.